Cancer is a disease that begins with mutation of critical genes: oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes. Mutation of critical genes allows for a cancer cell to evolve and ultimately results in pathogenic replication (a loss of normal regulatory control leading to excessive cell proliferation) of various given types of cells found in the human body. Conventional cancer treatments have focused mainly on killing cancerous cells. Such treatments threaten noncancerous cells, inherently are stressful to the human body, produce many side effects, and are of uncertain efficacy. More important, such treatment regimens are not necessarily directed toward the actual root of the cancer problem or its prevention.
Other diseases are associated with excessive cell death. For example, diseases associated with the loss of neurons in different regions of the central nervous system (CNS), including, for example, brain tissue and the spinal cord, such as Alzheimer's disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (“ALS” or “Lou Gehrig's disease”), Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, brain aging, Friedreich's ataxia, multiple sclerosis, diabetic necrosis, ischaemia, and stroke. These types of diseases are exemplary of diseases and disorders collectively referred to as “neurodegenerative diseases.” Treatment and prevention of neurodegenerative disorders remains elusive in that many proposed treatment methods are not practical since exogenous administration of numerous putative therapeutics is not efficacious due to their general inability to cross the blood-brain barrier.
Thus, there is a need in the art for therapeutic methods to prevent or reduce the risk of the development of cancer and/or the development of neurodegenerative diseases.